Authors: Elana Johnson
I hadn’t told Grandmother, knowing she’d simply say to focus on my training and leave politics to the politicians. Yet my mind wanders around Oake’s words, seeking their weight, and how they can impact my life here in Iskadar, which sits so near Nyth.
So today, a Saturday, she’s settled into our normal Sunday routine. I love her for it; for noticing the disquiet in me, and offering me an anchor to hold.
“The magicians divided the lands into kingdoms, and gifted peoples, and acreage, and riches to each king, with the specific instruction to rule them well. Kings are held to a higher standard, the standard of the magicians. But one king, King Gustus, didn’t do as counseled.”
She pauses again and I close my eyes to better imagine what color evil magic would stain the sky. Dark green bleeds over the backs of my eyelids, and I wonder what scent would accompany such sorcery.
I force Oake’s words from my mind and allow myself to get lost in the rhythmic rocking of Grandmother’s chair. The summer breeze moans around the corners of the house, a dry sound to which I am accustomed.
“Throughout the ages, the kings of the world have, for the most part, ruled honorably. In the cases they have not, the ancients have removed them from service. For that’s what a king does: He serves his people. King Gustus forgot this priority and made his people serve him. That was the beginning of his end. For the magicians want people to work in harmony with the lands, and with one another.”
“Did they give King Gustus another chance?” I ask.
“Yes, child. The magicians are the epitome of kindness and longsuffering. They will give a king many chances to rule properly.”
I feel warm at this assurance. The magicians of Relina are kind, and surely my mother has found what she seeks. “Will Mother come home soon, then?”
Grandmother’s chair squeaks to a stop. “Why would you think that?”
I open my eyes to find her studying me. “Well, if the magicians are the epitome of kindness, surely they have granted her wish to be reunited with Father.”
The lines around her eyes tighten. “You’re right, Echo. She probably is with your father again.” The squeaking and splintering picks up again. “But I don’t think either one of them will be returning to us.”
Her words cut deep, reopening an old wound, but I don’t let her see that. I pinch my eyes closed to keep the tears from falling as she continues her story about the ancient magicians, and how they painted the skies violet in their faraway lands, how they bewitched the winds to whisper magical melodies to those who know how to listen.
Though I hunger to know everything about the birthplace of magic—a place from which Grandmother hails but rarely speaks of—I feel hollow inside, knowing for certain that my parents will not return. It isn’t until I’m lying in bed that night that I realize what Grandmother has told me. The ancients did not bring Father back to Mother.
They took Mother to meet Father.
#
I opened my eyes to sunshine in a blue sky, not purple as Grandmother claimed existed in Relina. I remembered that she spoke of days on a ship, “crossing waters as endless as time,” she said.
Though she’d been only a handful of years old when she left Relina, Grandmother wore the sickness on her face for her homeland. She said the magic didn’t speak nearly as loudly here as it had in Relina, that though people in Iskadar were kind, gracious, and forgiving, they paled in comparison to the order and unity of Relina’s population.
I’d questioned her about returning to the land of her birth, but she claimed such things were not possible. “Those lands are lost. It takes a special ship, with a captain of the proper birthright, to find them.”
“Surely we can simply look to the sky,” I had said, repeating something Grandmother had often told me.
Look to the skies, Echo
, she would whisper.
You’ll find me there.
She shook her head, lost inside her thoughts.
Sighing away the memories, I sat up and found my bedroom empty save for the scent of freshly baked bread. A platter of it sat on the night table next to my bed. I chewed through a piece while I stretched my muscles and exercised my joints.
Satisfied that my body worked the way it always had, I went into the courtyard.
Castillo stood abruptly and eliminated the distance between us. He took me in his arms and breathed in the scent from my hair. My maids had removed all traces of blood from my skin; my nightclothes had been replaced; my hair washed. I wondered what Lucia had done when she saw me. I would weep for her, as she was my closest friend.
I melted into his embrace and clung to him with worry in my grip, my insides suddenly swimming.
“Thank you,” he breathed into my ear.
I pressed my fingertips into his shoulders, then his back, then I explored down his sides, confirming that he was unbroken. “You’re alive,” I whispered.
“Thanks to you.” He drew back and looked down into my face. “You’re a remarkable healer.”
“Mariana—”
“She did nothing,” he said. “Her magical ability is only a fraction of yours.”
“I think she panicked,” I said. “How did you come to be so injured?”
He frowned and leaned closer. “I do not wish to discuss it.”
“Castillo.” Clear warning laced my voice.
“I went home, to Nyth.”
Images of the High King singing until Castillo’s bones split ran through my mind. He could wound with his voice
and
his fists—I’d already seen him raise his hand as if to strike Cris. The thought of the High King even looking at Castillo the wrong way made me sick.
“Nyth,” I mused. “I’m glad you’re well, then.” My words melted his stoic exterior. He pressed his lips to mine. I drank in his smell, the taste of him, greedily, thinking this might be the last time I could experience him this way. I feared the Prince would be making his selection soon, and I knew Castillo wouldn’t do anything to hurt his brother—which included kissing me.
The next day, I sought after Mari. I found her sequestered in her suite, her eyes bloodshot and her chest heaving with hiccups. “Mari.” I sat next to her on the bed. “What’s the matter?”
She shook her head, fresh tears spilling down her cheeks. Wrinkled handkerchiefs littered the bedspread where Mari lay, and I began sweeping them into a pile for her clothing matron to launder.
“I couldn’t heal him,” she said between hiccups. “I tried, and my magic was so weak. I’ve been releasing it every day at the pools.” She covered her face in her hands and sobbed.
I patted her on the back and smoothed her hair away from her face. “You tried. That’s what matters.” When she didn’t quiet, I began humming the lullaby Grandmother had sung for me the day Olive left. I felt the magic flare through me, and I urged it to go.
Mari’s muscles relaxed and her cries subsided. I signaled to her maid that we needed food, and minutes later a tray arrived. The lamb chops made my mouth water and my stomach roar.
“Come eat,” I said to Mari and “Thank you,” to her maid. The young woman ducked her head and backed out of the room. “You’ll need your strength.”
Mari joined me at the table, her hair a tangled mess and still gasping for a proper breath. “What would I need strength for?”
“For speaking with Cris.”
She brightened considerably at the mention of the Prince, and I suddenly wondered why she’d been in Cris’s suite so late at night. “You’re in love with him,” I blurted, hoping they had simply been finishing their date.
She jerked her eyes to mine. “You aren’t?”
I supposed some of the feelings I’d experienced over the past couple of months could be classified as love. At the very least, they weren’t hatred. I remembered the last kiss we’d shared, and a hot iron flared inside my chest.
“No.” My voice sounded strained. “I’m not in love with him.”
Mari flashed the tiniest of smiles. “I think he’ll choose you now,” she said, the nasal quality returning to her voice.
I chewed slowly, hoping to give Mari the impression that I was considering her words. “He doesn’t love me.”
I didn’t want to give Mari the crown, even if I didn’t love Cris, even if I didn’t want to be rule Nyth. I wouldn’t be able to do anything to help my countrymen—or magicians—if I didn’t become Queen. “He does not have to.” Mari pushed her food around on the plate. “He needs someone who can wield magic.”
I looked up at her, wondering how she knew such things. Had Cris told her, or did she have a guard who shared information? “Mari, can I trust you?”
“Of course.” She put down her utensils and studied me. Even without makeup, she was beautiful and now that she’d stopped crying, she seemed very confident.
“Castillo doesn’t think Cris will make a very good king.”
Mari leaned closer. “My guards say the same thing. Solis, especially.”
“Castillo would like to see Cris with someone who can protect him from his father.”
“I would like that, too,” Mari said. “The man is simply awful to Cris.” She crossed her arms as her eyes took on a furious quality. The chill in her expression caused a shiver to slide over my arms.
“Well,” she said. “I’ll advise you to be aware of Castillo.”
“What do you mean?”
She peered at me. “Castillo wants the throne.”
I laughed, because the absurdity of such a statement required it. “That’s not true.”
Mari remained stoic. “It
is
true. Though nobody in Nyth acknowledges his royal status, everyone knows Castillo should rightfully be the next king—and that he wants to be.”
“The next king?” I had the sudden urge to get back to my courtyard so I could sing the songs I needed to discover Castillo’s birth. Though I was weary of such intrigue, I didn’t want to learn this sensitive information from Mari.
Before I could excuse myself, she said, “He’s four days older than Cris, and the first son of Javier de la Fuenta. He should be High King of Nyth.”
“Even though his mother was not Queen?” I knew enough politics to know Castillo was the bastard son of the High King, and bastards were never in line for the throne.
“Castillo has long petitioned for equality when it comes to the royal bloodlines.”
“Meaning . . .” My mind leaped in circles, and my hands twisted around each other while I thought. “He doesn’t believe it matters if you come from one or not. You don’t have to be royal to be royalty.”
Castillo’s goals sounded a lot like mine. All he wanted was to establish a practice that allowed all people to be treated fairly. It was exactly what I desired for magicians. If he succeeded in his plans, he should be the next High King of Nyth. He could be living in luxury instead of a one-room bedroom that doubled as a dining room and a bathroom. His plot to ensure Cris didn’t rule Nyth made much more sense now.
I wondered what Castillo had been doing in Nyth these past few weeks.
Was he truly on an errand for Cris? Or one of his own?
I wondered why he’d leave out this important detail and if I could really trust him at all. The thought made me hurt. More than I had when I’d taken his pain into my own body. More than when I had fled Iskadar, leaving Oake behind to face the hunting parties alone.
“I must go,” I managed to say through a throat too thick to swallow. Mari walked me to the door and hugged me goodbye. Thankfully, Matu waited in the hall.
#
That night, as I stood over a sleeping Castillo, an invasion song confirmed Mari’s accusations. Cris and Castillo grew up together under the motherly eye of Helena, but Castillo was born first. I leaned over him as images from his childhood rebounded in my mind.
I left before I found out if he wanted to be High King or not. I couldn’t stomach the thought of him using me that way. I felt so foolish, and that lent itself to anger.
Luckily, Castillo needed to rest more than usual because of his recent injuries, the cause of which I still didn’t know. I wanted to sing another invasion song, but I feared the sharp edges the answers would carry.
I spent hours in the gardens with Matu, and many more in the sewing room with Lucia. With the machine running or our drawing pages out, my thoughts didn’t tangle the way they did in the soft minutes before I fell asleep at night.
Cris and I spent hours together eating, and talking, and midnight strolling. I found that I could easily fall in love with him, and I didn’t entirely blame him for perpetuating the charade of courting the other girls.
“Father has finally approved my selection,” Cris said one evening as I settled in our favorite spot next to the river. He sat next to me and loosely took my hand in his. “Do you wish to know who I chose?”
I cut a glance at him and found a rare smirk on his face. “Surprise me.”
He leaned close and kissed me, a short, chaste union of our mouths. “A surprise it shall be.”
#
The next morning, Bo magically amplified his voice and made an announcement through the compound. “His Majesty has made his selection. He chooses for his bride the lovely Echo del Toro of Iskadar.”
I’d been summoned to an engagement party that evening, but I didn’t feel like celebrating. I imagined Mari prostrate on her bed, surrounded by cried-through handkerchiefs. The thought brought an ache to my skull that the strongest medicine couldn’t relieve. And Lucia had brought me three doses.
I still hadn’t spoken to Castillo, and the words piled inside, almost ready to come surging out. I didn’t know if I’d be able to control them—a danger, considering I’d be meeting Cris in less than a half hour.
I knew Castillo would be waiting in the hall. I didn’t assume he’d allow anyone else to escort me to this occasion for which he’d so carefully planned. I sat in front of the mirror, watching as Lucia braided and wrapped my hair into an elegant knot. Greta brought out the highlights in my skin and made my lips as red as blood. My eye makeup was dark and striking, with a hint of gold in the corners, like wings. She was truly masterful with a brush, and I told her so.
She smiled and continued dabbing at my lips until they shone. Lucia helped me into a dress that hugged my chest and hips and flared to the ground around my bare feet.